I never like to type in my address anyware unless I know its the real deal.

Slowing down/stoping phone calls would be nice as well.

Only un solicited mail I like is from my local pizza shop!

What say you?

I want MORE junk mail. [not junk e-mail] The city collects recyclables and then sells them. They make a net profit. The more junk mail I get, the more $$ the city makes.

In theory I could just sign up for every catalog available, but I wouldn't do that because it would be wasteful and I'd be intentionally taking advantage of the vendor. Now, if somehow I got on a junk mail list without any underhandedness on my part, that would be kewl! Maybe I should send in a small donation to <insert politically active group who's views I disagree with>, that should get me 'on da list'.

I have an agreement with the person who delivers my mail. I put a separate box for "junk mail" She makes a guess as to whether stuff is junk or real and deposits all the junk in the junk box. Once a month, I pull it out, do a quick flip through to make sure nothing important slipped through, then dump all of it into the recycle bin (also out at the street).

Anything else that's junk (essentially anything sent Presorted Standard from a company I don't do business with) I mark "Refused" and put back in the mailbox, since if I didn't ask for it I'm going to accept it.

If you get any particularly annoying mailers, fill out a Form 1500. It's for stopping "arousing" mail, but courts have ruled that the decision is entirely up to the recipient, and so it makes it illegal for the mailer to mail you anything else for several years (I think 5).

I've got a large mailbox and occasionally I toss in a match. Just kidding. Actually, I signed up to stop junk mail which took care of a lot of it. Nothing seems to thwart Mediacom from their unless stream of offers. Fortunately, there is a good recycling program.

Of all the things in this world to complain about I never understood people who get so upset about unsolicited mail. Do you get equally upset when a tv commerical comes on during one of your programs? Do you get upset when you see an advertisement in the newspaper or magazine you're reading? Direct mail is just another form of advertising (which,by the way,subsidizes first class mail in the post office).

All you have to do is write to the Direct Marketing Association in New York and add your name to their name removal program...this will eventually stop most, but not all, junk mail. Or, just recycle the mail in your "blue recycling bin"...big deal. Now go out and concern yourself with more important things.

lucky3 wrote:Of all the things in this world to complain about I never understood people who get so upset about unsolicited mail. Do you get equally upset when a tv commerical comes on during one of your programs? Do you get upset when you see an advertisement in the newspaper or magazine you're reading? Direct mail is just another form of advertising (which,by the way,subsidizes first class mail in the post office).

All you have to do is write to the Direct Marketing Association in New York and add your name to their name removal program...this will eventually stop most, but not all, junk mail. Or, just recycle the mail in your "blue recycling bin"...big deal. Now go out and concern yourself with more important things.

Lucky3

+1 Direct Marketing worked for me years ago and still working

"One does not accumulate but eliminate. It is not daily increase but daily decrease. The height of cultivation always runs to simplicity" –Bruce Lee

Jerilynn wrote:I want MORE junk mail. [not junk e-mail] The city collects recyclables and then sells them. They make a net profit. The more junk mail I get, the more $$ the city makes.

I like the junk mail too. Our trash collection service awards points based on the amount of recyclable materials we give them, and when we accumulate enough points we redeem them for gift cards. I have a $10 Walmart gift card right now that I got for redeeming recycle points.

lucky3 wrote:Of all the things in this world to complain about I never understood people who get so upset about unsolicited mail. Do you get equally upset when a tv commerical comes on during one of your programs? Do you get upset when you see an advertisement in the newspaper or magazine you're reading? Direct mail is just another form of advertising (which,by the way,subsidizes first class mail in the post office).

Also, commercials don't fill up my mailbox when I am away from home with a bunch of unwanted junk and cause my mailcarrier to get upset with me because there is no room to deliver the mail that I want.

lucky3 wrote:"Of all the things in this world to complain about I never understood people who get so upset about unsolicited mail...."

Occasionally I will receive an envelope with something important inside. Searching for that rare form of correspondence amongst the piles of junk paper is like searching for a needle in a haystack, but you're forced to search.

You don't have to do this. If you look at the bottom of the page (on the blue bar), there's a link that says "Subscribe topic". Click it and you will get update notifications. Note: if you are subscribed, the link will show as "Unsubscribe topic". Click it to stop the notifications.

lucky3 wrote:Of all the things in this world to complain about I never understood people who get so upset about unsolicited mail. Do you get equally upset when a tv commerical comes on during one of your programs?

I have not watched a commerical for about 3-4 years, well kinda of. I do look forward to the superbowel. I DVR everthing

lucky3 wrote:Of all the things in this world to complain about I never understood people who get so upset about unsolicited mail. Do you get equally upset when a tv commerical comes on during one of your programs? Do you get upset when you see an advertisement in the newspaper or magazine you're reading?

The difference is that newspaper, magazine and TV ads all help subsidize the cost of the content. It's a fair and conscious trade, I get a reduced price on what I want to read or watch and they get some minimal amount of my attention. If I want to avoid the ads, I can (and have) used higher cost, but ad-free, substitutes like books, member-supported magazines (such as Consumer Reports, Undercurrent (a scuba magazine), and Cook's Illustrated) or DVDs.

You don't have to do this. If you look at the bottom of the page (on the blue bar), there's a link that says "Subscribe topic". Click it and you will get update notifications. Note: if you are subscribed, the link will show as "Unsubscribe topic". Click it to stop the notifications.

I keep a Google Drive spreadsheet list of unwanted mail and contact everyone directly via whatever means I can find (email, web form, phone). Sure this has taken time, but I loathe junk mail! Over 3 years it is 84 lines long. What it has told me is that many companies sending this stuff don't have any coherent facility for opting out, but it seems to have worked in the end.

For the obvious stuff I use Catalog Choice. I did their paid service for one year and even though that has ended it seems to have done a good job keeping it down.

lucky3 wrote:Of all the things in this world to complain about I never understood people who get so upset about unsolicited mail. Do you get equally upset when a tv commerical comes on during one of your programs? Do you get upset when you see an advertisement in the newspaper or magazine you're reading?

The difference is that newspaper, magazine and TV ads all help subsidize the cost of the content. It's a fair and conscious trade, I get a reduced price on what I want to read or watch and they get some minimal amount of my attention. If I want to avoid the ads, I can (and have) used higher cost, but ad-free, substitutes like books, member-supported magazines (such as Consumer Reports, Undercurrent (a scuba magazine), and Cook's Illustrated) or DVDs.

Hi, Alex. As one of those pesky junk mailers, albeit a very small one (I'm also a writer, editor, publisher and typical jack-of-all-trades in a very tiny small business), I thought I'd add a few thoughts.

You may get more "in return", at least for junk mail, than you think.

The much maligned junk mail (which used to be called bulk mail, but now goes by "standard" or "presort standard" mail), is a big chunk of the Postal Services' revenue, and likely helps the Postal Service stay open -- not that they're not on the ropes. But it ain't the evil junk mailers' fault. By law, each class of mail has to pay for itself. Meanwhile, the post office gets to spread its fixed costs over a larger revenue stream.

The junk/bulk/presort standard mailer's mail drop is pre-sorted, barcoded, inkjetted to postal address specifications, merge-purged, deduped, run thru NCOA (change of address) software, DMA edit drop software, and trayed/bagged/tagged so that it runs thru the postal system like a hot knife thru butter. All automated and computerized. And right to your mailbox, which is what some folks object to. A lot of first class mail is mailed in small volumes -- onesies and twosies. None of the pre-prep, none of the automation. The post office has to handle it in small volumes, by hand. BIG cost difference.

All this pre-prep costs the evil junk mailer a ton of money, while keeping a lot of people employed, and -- this may come as a shock -- the evil junk mailer does not, as an example, view his or her mission in life as filling up Alex's mailbox with unwanted stuff. In fact, he/she would absolutely love NOT to mail his/her expensive junk mail package [list broker fees, list rental fees, printing costs, lettershop fees, postage, business reply fees/annual fees ] to Alex's mailbox if he/she could just figure out HOW, beyond all the pre-prep mentioned above.

All this junk mail creates a LOT of employment, too, from tree farmers to pulp mills to paper manufacturers to mechanics who work on postal trucks, and on and on. And a lot of those jobs are here in the US. Just sayin'.

In the medium term, costs keep going up, and eventually, we'll be priced out of the junk mail market. But by then, maybe we'll be retired.

But, for now, the junk mailer sticks with what works. Just like those good folks at Consumer Reports, who also use junk mail to sell their product. Like the "last chance" (or some such) subscription renewal offers I get every so often, even though my subscription doesn't expire until July, 2020!

About a year ago I noticed on a credit card offer that the credit reporting agencies were selling my and my wife's name, and I could request them to stop by calling a number. Took about 5 minutes. We were getting 2 or 3 credit card offers every day. Now I get about 1 a month. It's worth a shot if that's your problem.

I used the DMA service a few years ago and over the next several months my junk mail tapered down to pretty near zero. If something does show up, I am compulsive about phoning that company and asking to have my name taken off their list AND not sold or rented to anyone else.

Credit bureaus have something the details of which escape me now where they sell your info to banks that send out credit card offers. Get off that too.

Despite that Chase kept sending me offer after offer. A letter to the CEO fixed that.

I'm on the federal Do Not Call list. That takes care of phone calls except from charities and politicians, both or which I just hang up on. I do make charitable contributions but never to places that phone me, only ones I've checked out.

The remaining problem is the overseas crooks (heather from card services, the ones "giving away free" alarm systems, etc.) I get probably five calls a week from those people even at 6 am and the FTC can do nothing. If I were Obama, I'd seriously send the CIA after them and toss them in Guantanamo. Or if anyone knows how to stop this, I'd certainly appreciate knowing.

bill99 wrote:Hi, Alex. As one of those pesky junk mailers, albeit a very small one (I'm also a writer, editor, publisher and typical jack-of-all-trades in a very tiny small business), I thought I'd add a few thoughts.

You may get more "in return", at least for junk mail, than you think.

Bill,

I don't see how these reasons make it right for Junk Mailers like you advised you are attempting to make money by invading our mailboxes with unwanted junk. It is much different than TV ads, radio commercials,and even email etc, which are easy to turn off and do not require disposal. To say that junk email is worse than a mailbox a hundred feet from my front door full of unwanted paper every day is just not accurate.

I'd just be happy if Oriental Trading Company stopped sending me 9-12 catalogs (3 every 3 days) per week!! That and AT&T sending me offers to convert to U-Verse once every 10 days. If it wasn't for the concern of buildup in my fireplace and chemicals from the ink, is use them as kindling in the fireplace!

I don't see how these reasons make it right for Junk Mailers like you advised you are attempting to make money by invading our mailboxes with unwanted junk. It is much different than TV ads, radio commercials,and even email etc, which are easy to turn off and do not require disposal. To say that junk email is worse than a mailbox a hundred feet from my front door full of unwanted paper every day is just not accurate.

It's not right. Every business that trashes the environment and annoys or worse people in its pursuit of profit thinks it's right or doesn't care whether it is or not.

I don't see how these reasons make it right for Junk Mailers like you advised you are attempting to make money by invading our mailboxes with unwanted junk. It is much different than TV ads, radio commercials,and even email etc, which are easy to turn off and do not require disposal. To say that junk email is worse than a mailbox a hundred feet from my front door full of unwanted paper every day is just not accurate.

I completely disagree. You have no choice but to sit through a radio or TV commercial to get to the programming. One alternative is to use a DVR and fast-forward through the commercials - which I do for about 80% of my TV viewing. Glancing at the junk mail and discarding it takes a second or two per piece, the functional equivalent of FF with the DVR. Now, if I had to read the contents of the junk mail before throwing it away, that would be the equivalent of TV and radio commercials.

I agree with bill99. Junk mail keeps lots of people employed, and provides a stable revenue source for USPS. I'll gladly spend 15 seconds a day in return for providing USPS with the revenue, not to mention all the printers and others employed before the items get to the postal service.

As for your statement about unwanted paper in your mailbox, you are still going to the mailbox once per day whether there is junk mail there or not. Is it really such a burden to carry a few catalogs or junk mail envelopes along with your bills?

"The course of history shows that as the government grows, liberty decreases." Thomas Jefferson

I'm busy plotting all that extra time I'm going to have on Saturdays come August. I figure it frees up about five minutes between going to the mailbox and tossing the junk. Call it four hours per year and 40 over the next decade.

deanbrew wrote:I agree with bill99. Junk mail keeps lots of people employed, and provides a stable revenue source for USPS. I'll gladly spend 15 seconds a day in return for providing USPS with the revenue, not to mention all the printers and others employed before the items get to the postal service.

As for your statement about unwanted paper in your mailbox, you are still going to the mailbox once per day whether there is junk mail there or not. Is it really such a burden to carry a few catalogs or junk mail envelopes along with your bills?

You're totally ignoring the fact that some recipients have said, I don't want this, don't do it to me. It's called control over one's life.

The junk mailer has no right to soak up any of their time, either sorting through mail, or carting stuff out to recycling. There is always an environmental cost - trees cut down, energy used to covert them to paper and print the junk, processing during recycling, perhaps extra trips and fuel use by recycling pickup trucks due to the overall volume. Multiply your oh, it's only a few seconds or a few pieces of paper or catalogs a day by millions of people for the environmental damage.

Suppose I want to do something else to you against your will that will "create jobs" and damage the planet? Do I have the right to do that?

The one saving grace is to never buy anything from a company that sends out junk mail, and to bad mouth them to everyone you know and on the Internet.

Rainier wrote:I'm busy plotting all that extra time I'm going to have on Saturdays come August. I figure it frees up about five minutes between going to the mailbox and tossing the junk. Call it four hours per year and 40 over the next decade.

I would be more that happy with just a tues/thurs schedule, but thats just me

Rainier wrote:I'm busy plotting all that extra time I'm going to have on Saturdays come August. I figure it frees up about five minutes between going to the mailbox and tossing the junk. Call it four hours per year and 40 over the next decade.

I would be more that happy with just a tues/thurs schedule, but thats just me

I live in a large condo building, if someone's mailbox overflows they bundle it up and move it to the package room. When we get a package, they turn on a little notification light in our unit. I've taken advantage of this and have everything important sent to my office address (it's our company and I process the mail). So I no longer check my mailbox. But I do get my packages. If the package turns out to be a bundle of mail, I head straight for the recycling bin. Unfortunately, the city and state sends some stuff to my home address, so I still have to sort it, but none of the bulk mail gets through my door.

Note that I have done all the stuff suggested above to cut down on the junk mail, but nothing stops it. If they had a federal Do Not Junk Mail list, I'd sign up in a minute.

What bothers me more than junk mail is Internet 'pop-ups'. The security software vendors have pretty well addressed the traditional pop-up problem, but the advertisers have managed to get around some of it by opening new windows with their ads instead.

trudy wrote:You're totally ignoring the fact that some recipients have said, I don't want this, don't do it to me. It's called control over one's life.

I recognize and appreciate this. I think people should be able to reduce the volume, if they wish. I don't wish to, and don't care enough to develop, entertain or use any options to reduce my junk mail.

The junk mailer has no right to soak up any of their time, either sorting through mail, or carting stuff out to recycling.

No right? If you use the US mail, people and companies have the right to mail stuff to you. Now, I (sort of) understand a (mild) annoyance or displeasure, but getting and sorting mail is a normal occurrence for most people that takes seconds. I don't think that rises to the level of "soaking up" time.

There is always an environmental cost - trees cut down, energy used to covert them to paper and print the junk, processing during recycling, perhaps extra trips and fuel use by recycling pickup trucks due to the overall volume. Multiply your oh, it's only a few seconds or a few pieces of paper or catalogs a day by millions of people for the environmental damage.

I would think this argument applies to almost anything and everything. Almost everything has an environmental impact of some sort. I don't get worked up about it.

Suppose I want to do something else to you against your will that will "create jobs" and damage the planet? Do I have the right to do that?

Like what? What would be analogous? I really don't see how using the US mail system assaults or damages you or your property in any way.

The one saving grace is to never buy anything from a company that sends out junk mail, and to bad mouth them to everyone you know and on the Internet.

Go ahead. On the list of things that bother me, junk mail ranks, oh, about 6,445,789th. But that's me. As I said, we all have our pet peeves and axes to grind. This just doesn't happen to be one of mine.

"The course of history shows that as the government grows, liberty decreases." Thomas Jefferson

Hi, Alex. As one of those pesky junk mailers, albeit a very small one (I'm also a writer, editor, publisher and typical jack-of-all-trades in a very tiny small business), I thought I'd add a few thoughts.

You may get more "in return", at least for junk mail, than you think....

[bunch of stuff about how junk mail supports the USPS]

All this junk mail creates a LOT of employment, too, from tree farmers to pulp mills to paper manufacturers to mechanics who work on postal trucks, and on and on. And a lot of those jobs are here in the US. Just sayin'.

FWIW, I don't buy either argument. As to the USPS, get rid of bulk mail rates entirely. Less junk mail will go out and what does will provide greater income.

And a shrinking of the junk mail industry does not necessarily mean jobs lost. Businesses need to get the word out, so they would shift to other outlets. Everything from newspapers to web designers would benefit. I'd bet whole new categories of advertising would arise, starting with opt-in commercial mail.

Even being dead does not get one off the junk mail list. I still receive junk mail for the previous owners of this house, who have been deceased 6 years and over 15 years respectively. Those for-profit "universities" tend to be the worst offenders in this category, along with Medicare vendors. At least that's the bulk of the junk mail I receive for the deceased previous owners. Heck, even I receive junk mail from the for-profit universities and I have a Ph.D., so I have no needs for their services. They obviously don't care about filtering their database to the most viable (or even living) market.

Not sure what motivates you to cast off an entire industry with one broad defamation of an industry. Some may be annoyed by third class mail, many others actually like receiving mail.

Third class mail actually subsidizes the cost of first class mail. Not sure how old you are, but you sound like an "internet generation kid". As for my age, let's say unsoliticed advertising mail help put my three sons through college!

lucky3 wrote:Not sure what motivates you to cast off an entire industry with one broad defamation of an industry. Some may be annoyed by third class mail, many others actually like receiving mail.

So make it opt-in. Or opt-out for that matter as long as there is a single central place to do it. Those who like it can get it and the rest of us can be left alone. Whenever this comes up somewhere, in any form, the DMA fights it tooth and nail. This gives lie to their claim that they care one bit about what consumers want.

Can you show me some evidence of this? I've been searching and all I can see are unsupported claims both ways. The law says that each class of mail must cover its own expenses, which suggests each class is revenue neutral, but I did find a 2010 OIG report (pdf) that states that the price breaks given for various types of pre-processing associated with other than first class mail were largely unjustified.

lucky3 wrote:Not sure how old you are, but you sound like an "internet generation kid". As for my age, let's say unsoliticed advertising mail help put my three sons through college!

FWIW, I'm 44. As to you putting your kids through college on junk mail, I fail to see how that is an argument in favor of unsolicited mass advertising. I never said it wasn't effective for the sender. It's the externalities that are the problem.

Can you show me some evidence of this? I've been searching and all I can see are unsupported claims both ways. The law says that each class of mail must cover its own expenses, which suggests each class is revenue neutral, but I did find a 2010 OIG report (pdf) that states that the price breaks given for various types of pre-processing associated with other than first class mail were largely unjustified.

The Post Office (USPS) is large, bureaucratic, and not extremely efficient. (Just read this report and management's response.) I just don't think they're capable of ultra preciseness or accuracy when they set rates for services. The report says their outsourcing of mail prep, etc. saved the Post Office $14.8 billion but gave $15 billion in discounts to mailers for doing the outsourced work. So basically, they trim mailer discounts by 1.3% and their outsourcing discounts to mailers equals Post Office savings.

Not exactly rocket science.

And, incidentally, part of that 1.3% consists of allowable-under-the-2006-postal-act "mail matter consisting exclusively of educational, cultural, scientific, or informational value" -- i.e., nonprofit mailings. Do we know how much of the small 1.3% differential is due to nonprofit mail discounts? No idea, at least from this report.

Finally, after reading the report, I'm not seeing it say that mailer discounts for bulk mail preprep were "largely unjustified." Looking at the numbers, they appear to be 98.7% justified. So maybe 1.3% largely unjustified? Which is pretty close to a bulls eye for an outfit like the Post Office. Again, that precision thing. They set rates each year, but they can't know exactly how mailers will respond. Will they mail more first class than bulk? More postcards than self-mailers? It's a moving target. I just don't see how they can nail it precisely at 100%.

There's so much ambiguity in the OIG report that I don't think you can use it to say first class subsidizes standard (i.e. bulk/third class, or for the perjorative-inclined, "junk") mail. The Post Office makes money on both (just not enough to cover its other expenses) and badly needs both.

Junk mailers are more offensive than spammers. I'm sure illegal spammers have kids to send to college also, and would write long posts to justify that. It just doesn't make it right to use the USPS to dump unwanted and useless paper at our homes every day.

It may be legal to be a junk mailer, but that doesn't make it ethical.

Last edited by Diogenes on Sat Feb 09, 2013 3:40 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Now my wife, son, myself and the current resident get the same offer, thats four at a one time. Wonder how long it will take to get my daughters name on the list so I can get 5 of the same offer!

I recall a time about 15 years ago when our cat was getting junk mail. We were at a school fundraiser and we put down our cats name (with our last name) in a drawing for a rocking chair, the cat one and the junk mail started to flow shortly after. Now did the school give it out I can't say for sure. could have been the Vet.

I wonder how much junk mail dead people get, my father has been gone for 12 years, my father-in-law been gone for 8 and they still get a fair share of junk mail.